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Saturday, June 11, 2005 |
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I don't think I can work this through in writing. The whole series of events leading up to and down from that pivotal moment. I feel unequal to the challenge of committing it to paper. When I was 14 I had a pet snake, a boa constrictor I named Oliver Twist. I was inexperienced at keeping reptiles. I'd grown up with dogs and cats, tropical fish and strawberry finches. True, I'd caught and released many a horny-toad (kids didn't call 'em horned lizards back then) on family weekends up around Castaic, and alligator lizards in L.A. alleyways. But I'd never caught or kept a snake. Oliver wasn't very big; he was an infant, really, only 18 inches long or thereabouts. Big enough to strangle and swallow a full-grown mouse. One day I had Oliver out of his tank and he crawled up my arm to the back of my neck and then up through my long hair to the top of my head. There he coiled and went to sleep. I was so silly. Because I'd read that the only time a boa might bite you is if you approach it suddenly from in front of its face. And I couldn't tell where his face was, so I was afraid to reach up and take hold of him to put him away, and so I sat there like that for a very long time. (In a recent dream this scene played out again, only with an owl instead of a snake.) My point is, I don't know how to approach the writing I need to do about That Day. No matter which direction I reach toward it from it's liable to bite. I don't want to be blatantly self-serving. I'd prefer to write it out from imagined observers' views and then inform that with my private turmoil. But my reactions were fueled by emotions that have roots far in the past, so I'd have to preface everything with explication--oh, exhausting, exhausting, and to what end? The off chance that Josh might read this far down in the blog and maybe comprehend it? Too much cynicism all around.
Actions in the world have more meaning than language--images, 3-D interactions with surroundings more powerful than words--so perhaps I'll chicken out and stick with uncovering the herb garden. Or maybe not. Just how long can I sit with this snake on my head? |
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Early Saturday morning It happened at the birthday party last fall. And for a while afterward I awoke crying every morning, and went to sleep crying every night. My pain and rage consumed me. It finally sent me over the edge of a complete mental breakdown. I never knew what that meant before. Always presumed a life lived with love and generosity was immune to such indulgences. Now I know that no one's immune, and the perception of love and generosity is entirely relative. I plunged deep, and it was a good thing I lived far from human witnesses--except for my brother, who ought not to have been with me then, for his sake. But there are no options where he is concerned. His presence probably kept me from going completely mad, my responsibility for him gave me something to hang onto. The care and feeding of pets, too, helped make a rhythm in the days. Possibly most healing was the morning and evening work with tarot images I was already in the habit of. They acted on my subconscious, doing their work, possibly, even when I was at my worst. After a while I stopped crying every day, but to this minute I relive that scene, that train wreck of lives that happened at the birthday party. And I'll never get past it until I express it, maybe. I tried to meditate this morning--guided, journey--and saw myself before a high-rise hotel. I pushed open the double glass doors and entered. Smelled that new hotel smell. Climbed the great carpeted staircase to the second floor. A hallway. Bright light at one end. I walked there. Guests sat in soft armchairs reading newspapers in sun that streamed through floor-to-ceiling windows. I wanted to stay there but though I kept imagining myself sinking into the cushions in the warmth and light, I couldn't make it happen. At the end of another hall I glimpsed the first steps of another flight of stairs. I walked there, and, ignoring the exit door nearby, began another climb, up and around, and I saw a door at the top, a gray door with a bright metal knob. I began climbing up toward it, but it receded and receded before me; I climbed and climbed, for years it seemed, sensing and discarding my frustration and irritation, single-mindedly climbing up toward it with my arm outstretched. Finally I felt the cold brass of the knob in my hand, and I turned it and pushed open the door--into that moment at the birthday party, that scene, that horror, and I was halted, paralyzed, as it played out before me. So I know now I'll never move an inch from where I am, spiritually or physically, if I don't finally work this through thoroughly, on paper, on screen, from every angle. This is my assignment for the weekend. In the intervals, when I take a break from writing, I've committed myself to clearing the spaces around the herbs outside, creating a garden around the plants I brought with me last year, and to begin transplanting cottonwood saplings from upstream, just as though I meant to stay here a very long time. Just as if I were loving back what has been loving me all along--the life around me that only wants more life, more life, more life. I can help make that happen here, even if it's temporary.
Tomorrow is my grandson's fifth birthday. I miss my family very much. |
